1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to, in a paper-leaves division system for use, for example, in postal organizations or the like, a paper-leaves transferring apparatus suitably employable in separating a plurality of paper leaves such as mail, deposited together in a bundle, to convey them one by one to a partitioning section.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the recent years, a mail division apparatus, which includes a recognizing function for reading a bar-code attached to mail or a character recognizing function for reading destination information such as a postal code to divide the mail automatically on the basis of these destination information, has been put in practical use. Such a paper-leaves division apparatus, which is made to handle mail or the like (which will be referred to hereinafter to xe2x80x9cpaper leavesxe2x80x9d), has been required to meet requirements such as space-saving, labor-saving, cost reduction and fast operation. A means to realize the fast operation of these requirements has been required to eliminate the occurrence of troubles in the middle of the conveyance and further to accomplish the conveyance and the partitioning operation more promptly and accurately.
In general, such a type of paper-leaves division apparatus is designed to separate a plurality of paper leaves to be divided, deposited together in a bundle in a stand-up condition in a depositing section and fed to a separating/supplying section, one by one and subsequently send them successively toward the downstream side. The separating/supplying section is equipped with a separating/supplying belt so that the paper leaves are carried in the stand-up condition until arriving at a contact position with the separating/supplying belt and, when reaching the separating/supplying belt position, they are almost vertically fed in an upward direction, i.e., toward the downstream side, in a state attached onto the separating/supplying belt by vacuum suction. In addition, the movement of the paper leaves from the depositing section to the separating/supplying section is accomplished by a paper-leaves conveying means equipped with an arm for supporting side surfaces of the paper leaves.
In the paper-leaves conveying means, the arm is made to protrude and retreat into/from the interior of the depositing section, and protrudes into the interior of the depositing section when the paper leaves are sent to a paper-leaves feeding position at which the separating/supplying belt lies, and supports the side surfaces of the paper leaves in that state, thus enabling the paper leaves to shift toward the paper leaves feeding position. In addition, when the paper leaves approach the paper-leaves feeding position, the arm retreats gradually. Thereafter, the paper leaves are handed over to the separating/supplying belt to be fed to the downstream side by the separating/supplying belt.
Accordingly, if the separating/supplying section cannot achieve the separation of the paper leaves properly and promptly, then this has great influence on the handling ability, for that difficulty is encountered in handling a large number of paper leaves at a high speed.
In addition, if the repeated operations such as the transfer of the paper leaves to the separating/supplying section and the separation of the paper leaves in the separating/supplying section are not conducted promptly and accurately, this has adverse effect on the subsequent address information reading accuracy and conveying/partitioning operations.
The above-mentioned paper-leaves conveying means with the conventional construction has no choice other than the arm retreating gradually as the paper leaves approach the paper-leaves feeding position, and since the arm cannot reach the separating/supplying belt in the protruding state immediately before the paper leaves come into contact with the separating/supplying belt, the paper leaves can frequently fall into an backwardly inclined condition to fall down immediately before the paper-leaves feeding position. For this reason, in order to bring the paper leaves, inclinable backwardly to fall down, into contact with the separating/supplying belt, there is a need for an operator to raise up the paper leaves at the paper-leaves feeding position or to directly support the paper leaves by hand immediately before the paper-leaves feeding position, which creates problems in safety, lowered work efficiency and increased burden on the operator. In addition, in the case of the conventional mechanism/system, when the arm retreats gradually in response to the paper leaves approaching the paper-leaves feeding position, the conveying speed reduces or gains with respect to a desired speed before the paper-leaves feeding position so that the interval of the paper leaves lengthens or shortens before the paper-leaves feeding position to deviate from a proper value. For example, in a case in which a speed for when the paper leaves are successively conveyed to the paper-leaves feeding position is higher than a speed for when the paper leaves are fed toward the downstream side at the paper-leaves feeding position, the paper leaves can jam at the paper-leaves feeding position. In such a case, the preceding paper leaves are interposed between the belt surface of the separating/supplying belt and the succeeding paper leaves conveyed afterwards, and the load to be imposed increases to make difficult the smooth feeding operation at the separating/supplying belt. The worst of it may be that simultaneous feeding of two paper leaves occurs (overlap transportation).
As mentioned above, when a large number of paper leaves are conveyed fast and consecutively, the paper leaves can be fed in an overlapped condition in the separating/supplying section or fed at a distribution-impossible interval, which may cause a trouble that a partitioning operation of the paper leaves to be conducted in the middle of the conveyance does not correctly take place. Moreover, even in a case in which the overlap transportation does not occur at that time in the separating/supplying section, the interval of the paper leaves becomes unstable during the conveyance in the paper-leaves conveying path, and the interval between one paper leaf and another subsequent paper leaf lengthens or shortens extremely, which may cause the overlap transportation of the paper leaves or the occurrence of the distribution-impossible space, thus leading to the trouble that difficulty is experienced in conducting a proper partitioning operation for the paper leaves in the middle of the conveyance. Still moreover, since the paper leaves can have arbitrary and diverse thickness, if the paper-leaves conveying means is operated at a constant speed without considering the thickness of the paper leaves, at the feeding of thick paper leaves, a large space occurs thereafter to produce a wasteful time of several seconds in the following feeding, which can lower the handling ability of the machine.
The present invention has been developed in consideration of the above-mentioned problems, and it is therefore an object of the invention to provide a paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system, which is capable of feeding the paper leaves smoothly without placing a full-time operator at the paper-leaves feeding position and of eliminating the work requiring the hands of the operators for improving the safety and cutting the number of persons.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a paper-leaves feeding apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system, which is capable of feeding the paper leaves smoothly at the paper-leaves feeding position.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system, which has a construction capable of conveying the paper leaves to the paper-leaves feeding position where the paper leaves are separated and fed one by one to the downstream side, and of conducting a prompt and proper separating/feeding operation of the paper leaves at the paper-leaves feeding position.
In accordance with the present invention, a paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system comprises paper-leaves conveying means for conveying a plurality of paper leaves, set together in a bundle in a depositing section, toward a paper-leaves feeding position where a separating/supplying belt is located to separate the paper leaves conveyed from each other and feed the paper leaves one by one, an arm being provided in the paper-leaves conveying means and being made to be moved toward the paper-leaves feeding position in a protruding condition into the interior of the depositing section while supporting side surfaces of the paper leaves, while being made to be retreated instantaneously from the interior of the depositing section immediately before the last paper leaf existing between the arm and the separating/supplying belt is handed over to the separating/supplying belt side. With this construction, since the paper leaves can be supported by the arm till just before the paper leaves are handed over to the separating/supplying belt, it is possible to eliminate the occurrence of the inclination and falling-down of the paper leaves immediately before the paper-leaves feeding position. This eliminates the work needed in the conventional apparatus, that is, the work of correcting the posture of the paper leaves inclined backwardly and falling down at the separating/supplying position or supporting the paper leaves by hand up to the paper-leaves feeding position, thus lightening the burden on work and avoiding the problem in safety, and further decreasing the number of full-time operators. In addition, since the arm transferring speed is maintainable at a desired speed until the arm retreats, it is possible to keep constant the density of the paper leaves existing immediately before the paper-leaves feeding position, thereby enabling smooth separation and feeding of the paper leaves and eliminating the simultaneous feeding of two paper leaves.
In addition, in the paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system according to the present invention, the paper-leaves conveying means includes cam means having a cam surface for controlling the protrusion/retreat of the arm and placed along a passage for the arm to the paper leaves, a partitioning arm device having a connection mechanism for maintaining the arm in a direction of the protrusion/retreat thereof and making a connection between the arm and the cam means to conduct the protrusion/retreat of the arm along the cam surface of the cam means, and conveying belt means for holding a plurality of partitioning arm devices, each corresponding to the first mentioned partitioning arm device, in a scattered condition, the conveying belt means being made to move circularly together with the partitioning arm devices for repeatedly making movement of the arm in a direction to the paper-leaves feeding position and movement of the arm in a direction separating from the paper-leaves feeding position. With this construction, the protruding/retreating operation of the arm is easily controllable through the use of the cam means and the connection mechanism.
Furthermore, in accordance with the present invention, a paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system comprises paper-leaves conveying means for conveying a plurality of paper leaves, set together in a bundle in a depositing section, to a paper-leaves feeding position in a stand-up condition, separating/supplying means including a separating/supplying belt made to revolve and having a belt surface positioned so that the paper leaves come successively into surface contact therewith when conveyed up to the phase-leaves feeding position and vacuum suction means for attaching the paper leaves onto a belt surface of the separating/supplying belt through the use of vacuum suction for feeding the paper leaves to the downstream side in accordance with the revolution of the separating/supplying belt, over-press detecting means for detecting the fact that the paper leaves are pressed excessively against the separating/supplying belt side at the paper-leaves feeding position, and control means for, when the over-press detecting means detects the excessively pressed condition of the paper leaves, implementing control of the paper-leaves conveying means so that the conveying direction of the paper leaves is temporarily switched to the opposite direction. With this construction, for example, at the paper-leaves feeding position, even if the paper-leaves conveying speed for when the paper leaves are conveyed to the paper-leaves feeding position is higher than the speed for when the paper leaves are fed through the separating/supplying belt, the excessively pressed condition of the preceding paper leaves against the belt surface side is detectable because, for example, the preceding paper leaves are pressed against the belt surface side by the succeeding paper leaves, and at this time the paper-leaves conveying speed by the paper-leaves conveying means is switched to the opposite direction to return the paper leaves, thereby accomplishing the feeding thereof while canceling the excessively pressed condition. Accordingly, the load the preceding paper leaves receive from the succeeding paper leaves is suppressible, thus achieving smooth feeding of the paper leaves through the separating/supplying belt at the paper-leaves feeding position.
Still furthermore, in the paper-leaves transferring apparatus for a paper-leaves division system, the paper-leaves conveying means comprises first paper-leaves conveying means having an arm for guiding the paper leaves in conveying toward the paper-leaves feeding position while supporting side surfaces of the paper leaves deposited in the depositing section and second paper-leaves conveying means for supporting lower surfaces of the paper leaves deposited in the depositing section, and the second paper-leaves conveying means includes main conveying belt means having a belt for conveying the paper leaves toward the paper-leaves feeding position in a state where the paper leaves are put thereon, and auxiliary conveying belt means provided between the main conveying belt means and the separating/supplying belt for conveying the paper leaves in forward and reverse directions. With this configuration, in order to eliminate the excessively pressed condition of the paper leaves at the paper-leaves feeding position, over-press canceling return control is implemented in a manner that only the auxiliary conveying belt means located at a position closest to the separating/supplying belt is rotationally driven in the reverse direction. That is, local control is easily executable.
Moreover, in the paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system according to the present invention, a belt surface of the auxiliary conveying belt means is made as a smooth surface. In this case, since the belt surface is made smooth, even if the belt is rotationally driven at a high speed to produce slipping with respect to the paper leaves, damages of the paper leaves such as peeling is preventable.
Still moreover, in the paper-leaves transferring apparatus for use in a paper-leaves division system according to the present invention, control means is provided so that the conveyance of the paper leaves by the first paper-leaves conveying means and the conveyance of the paper leaves by the main conveying belt means are stopped when the auxiliary conveying belt means is driven in the reverse direction. This signifies the division of control, which can provide an effect of canceling the over-press locally with respect to the paper leaves immediately before the separation/feeding section, and which is effective in a case in which the entire conveying section encounters the impossibility of the conveyance in the reverse direction.
In addition, a paper-leaves transferring apparatus according to the present invention comprises paper-leaves conveying means for conveying paper leaves, deposited together in a bundle through a depositing opening, to a paper-leaves feeding position in a stand-up condition, a separating/supplying section including a revolving separating/supplying belt with which the paper leaves conveyed to the paper-leaves feeding position come successively into contact so that the paper leaves are successively fed one by one to the downstream side through the revolution of the separating/supplying belt, paper-leaves thickness detecting means for detecting a thickness of the paper leaves fed from the separating/supplying section, and control means for controlling the conveyance of the paper leaves by the paper-leaves conveying means and the feeding of the paper leaves by the separating/supplying section and further for correcting the paper-leaves conveying speed of the paper-leaves conveying means on the basis of output information from the paper-leaves thickness detecting means. With this configuration, the thickness of the paper leaves fed from the paper-leaves feeding position by means of the separating/supplying belt is detected to implement feedback control for correcting, in accordance with the thickness of the paper leaves, the speed at which the paper-leaves conveying means conveys the paper leaves to the paper-leaves feeding position. This enables setting the contact force between the paper leaves to below a predetermined value at the paper-leaves feeding position to feed the paper leaves through the separating/supplying belt in a stably attached condition, which can prevent the preceding paper leaves from being excessively pressed by the succeeding paper leaves to cause the overlap transportation or can prevent the paper leaves from being fed at a distribution-impossible interval, thus achieving stable separation/supply of the paper leaves at the paper-leaves feeding position.
Still additionally, in the paper-leaves transferring apparatus according to the present invention, control means is provided so that, when the paper leaves do not arrive at the paper-leaves feeding position yet, the paper-leaves conveying means fast-conveys the paper leaves, deposited through the depositing opening, toward the paper-leaves feeding position. Since this control means fast-conveys the paper leaves to the paper-leaves feeding position when the paper leaves do not arrive at the paper-leaves feeding position, it is possible to accomplish the fast-handling which feeds the paper leaves consecutively from the paper-leaves feeding position without intermission.